Conference hydra::amiga_v1

Although I know virtually nothing about the Amiga version of Modula-II, I can
provide at least some about the language itself.

As such things go, it is not too new. It was intended (by its inventor, Wirth)
to be the successor to Pascal, actually, but never really caught on. Now
Modula-II itself has *two* successors: Modula-III (courtesy of DEC) and Oberon
(courtesy of Wirth).

The language does provide good functionality in the area of modularizaion, and
supports coprocessing directly (i.e., has directives such as "cobegin" and
"coend"). The latter only "kicks in" if you are actually running multiple
processors, otherwise the individual threads actually execute sequentially. I'm
afraid my memory is a bit fuzzy on any more details.

I personally don't expect Modula-II to gain any wide acceptance at this point.
The "audience" it would attract has become pretty much sold on Ada (please
don't kill the messenger, guys!), with the blessing of DOD, of course. Fans of
the language itself have probably staked their claim to either Modula-III or
Oberon. The syntax is very Pascalish and shouldn't be hard to pick up, though,
and $40 is one helluva price for a compiler; just don't expect any "chops" you
develop to be useful professionally or in other environments. (Yes, it's
possible, no, it's not likely.)

Hope this helps.

Cheers,
	Bob

    
    
    	Which Modula-II ?  There are at least 5 different compilers from
    5 different companies. Some of the modula-IIs are dead and gone.
    
    		Steve P.
    

    I have the Benchmark Modula-2 compiler. I haven't used it in a while
    but when I was hacking around with it I couldn't complain about bugs
    and such like - and it was fast (single pass compiler).
    
    Still, if you don't have an aversion to C that's probably a better
    choice as most people programming the Ami these days uses it.
    
    Mike

    I have used Benchmark Modula-2, TDI Modula-2, Sprint Modula-2 as well
    as SAS "C", Manx "C", and Metacomco Pascal.
    
    First, all the Modula-2 compilers were done by the same guy -- Wirth. 
    It is who is maintaining the compiler that matters.  The company you
    will have to deal with is arogant, and IMHO deceitful.
    
    You will be left with "C" if you decide not to use M2.  I realize that
    there is also Forth, APL and even a FORTRAN compiler available, but the
    sheer numbers of "C" crazies out there will force you in to one of the
    SAS or Manx "C" camps.  So you are stuck with a language which spent
    the first half of its stupidndess (intended) existance insisting that
    all the things which were added later were evil constructs which should
    never be added to a language.
    
    Forget Oberon, Wirth has completely lost it!  Read the spec and you
    will wonder, "just what kind of drug causes this state of mind?"
    
    So, again you are stuck with SAS or Manx.  I would especially avoid the
    M2 stuff if it is TDI Modula-2.  If it is BenchmarkM2, then you only
    have to worry about dealing with a (again IMHO) flakey company.
    
    Save you money and buy a real support package (not that either SAS or
    Manx actually support their really BAD compilers), even if you can't
    buy a real language.
    
    "C" "Csucks"
    
    Clark Williams
    (Often forced to program in "C" with a gun at his head and the fate of
    the world held in the balance.)